VTAM operator command fundamentals

A VTAM® operator command consists of the command name or its abbreviation, and various operands that describe the operation to perform. Each VTAM operator command has a procedure name, referred to as procname in the command syntax, which tells the operating system to route the command to VTAM for processing. Values for procname vary according to the command and the operating system but procname must always appear as the first operand of a command.

For example, the following command includes the verb (DISPLAY) and the procname (NET): DISPLAY NET,LMTBL,ID=applname,TYPE=LUNAME,LUNAME=luname
  • The value of procname for VTAM commands, other than the MODIFY command, is NET.
  • The value of procname for the MODIFY commands depends on the value specified in the START command:
    • If procname was specified in the START command in the form startname.ident, where startname is the name of the VTAM start procedure and ident is an optional procedure name identifier, then procname can be specified as either startname.ident or simply ident for the MODIFY command.
      For example, if the specification in the START command uses the .ident extension (NETID.ident), then the MODIFY command can use either of the following specifications:
      MODIFY NETID.ident,NOTRACE,TYPE=BUF,ID=name,SCOPE=ONLY  
        
      MODIFY ident,NOTRACE,TYPE=BUF,ID=name,SCOPE=ONLY  
    • If procname was specified in the START command in the form startname, where startname is the name of the VTAM start procedure, then it must also be specified as startname for the MODIFY command.
      So, if the procname specified in the START command is NETID, the MODIFY command shown in the following sample must also have the same procname specification:
      MODIFY NETID,NOTRACE,TYPE=BUF,ID=name,SCOPE=ONLY  

To avoid needless repetition, the NET operand is not described for every command. However, for MODIFY commands whose procnames depend upon the type of operating system used, each possibility is described.